


A Never Ending Bake Sale

by ladygray99



Category: Longmire (TV)
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-02
Updated: 2016-11-02
Packaged: 2018-08-28 17:36:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,064
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8455621
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladygray99/pseuds/ladygray99
Summary: Walt had never felt his years until he first saw Henry with reading glasses.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [crookedcig](https://archiveofourown.org/users/crookedcig/gifts).



> This can be read as either Slash or Gen. I do make references to some things in the books and I think it might be a little more Book!Henry and TV!Walt but the fact that I find Henry a little sexy in reading glasses is entirely LDP's fault.

Walt watched Henry slide the bar napkin with a young lady’s phone number into his pocket. She had to be younger than Cady, which made her young enough to be Henry’s daughter. Henry gave her a dazzling smile as she threw him one last wink before leaving the Red Pony. She was blond with jeans that looked too tight to do anything useful in and had spoken with the low tones of an Eastern European mother tongue.

When the door closed behind her Henry pulled out the napkin and his reading glasses. He didn’t put them on, simply held them unfolded in front of his eyes for a few seconds before hurrying to put both the glasses and the number away.

“Are you going to call her?”

“I may.”

Walt had never felt his years until he first saw Henry with those glasses squinting at a blown-out fuse box at the Red Pony. He was more aware of the glasses than the fact that Henry was contemplating fixing a burnt-out fuse with an old nickel, possibly burning down the Pony and killing them all in the process. In the end it was decided that Henry could serve beer by the light of an old Coleman lamp.

“She’s got to be younger than Cady.”

“By several years.”

“I don’t recall getting attention from women that young when I was that young.”

Henry cleared away the three empty bottles that were sitting in front of him. It was a quiet night and there were only two other drinkers in the place. “That is because when you were that age you had already made yourself a promise to a woman you had danced with a few times and kissed once. Blondes passing through town can smell that type of honor on a man.”

“Do I still smell honorable?”

“Yes.”

“And you don’t?” Walt picked at the label of the beer still held between his hands. Henry was easily the most honorable man Walt knew. 

Henry smirked. “To--” He pulled out the napkin again and squinted at the name, holding it at arm’s length. “Mia, I am a hope for an exotic story with a sprinkle of daddy issues.”

“Not the marrying kind.”

“And to which of us are you referring?”

Walt didn’t answer. Henry had been the first of them to kiss a girl at fourteen and had bragged about it in the way of stupid teenaged boys. At least until that girl punched him. There had been a string of them after that. Some serious, many lasting no more than a night. Some of the longer-term ones Walt had approved of, some nice Cheyenne girls with good strong hearts in them who would have been good for Henry. Then there were others who had done little more than take Henry for a ride. Dena was the most notorious but not the first. Occasionally Walt would have little rants at Martha about it. She’d smile and tell him Henry was just killing time until the one he was waiting for was ready.

He worked his thumb under the beer label trying to think. He knew he had some bad habits when it came to people. He relied on them either a little too much or not enough. Didn’t talk when he should. And once he got to the point where he knew someone, or at least thought he did, it took a lot to change his mind about them, to see things that didn’t fit. That was a bad habit for a lawman if ever there was one. 

He considered all he knew of Henry. A lifetime of actions. His honor. Devotion to his people. Love of his family. He remembered the way Henry had first held Cady, no hint of tremble in his large hands, unlike Walt’s which would not stop shaking. He thought about Henry.

“Martha always said you were waiting for someone.”

“She was a wise woman.”

Walt just nodded in agreement. He didn’t ask who Henry was waiting for. If his own guess was right, then it didn’t really change much in the grand scheme of things. And if he was wrong then it mattered even less. 

He swished the last of the beer around the bottom of the bottle feeling no need to talk. That was one of the things about Henry he always found comfort in: silence. He never felt the need to fill it because it wasn’t a thing to be filled. Silence existed in its own right.

One of the other patrons of the Red Pony waved for another drink. One more after that and Henry would cut him off. Probably with a bit of complaint but he didn’t look too aggressive to Walt’s eyes. He’d been an unofficial bouncer for the Pony more than once.

“Should I cut you off for the night as well?”

Walt shook his head. Henry took the now empty bottle with its half-peeled label and left him still in silence before returning with two cups of coffee.

Walt wrapped his hands around his cup. It was warm but not hot enough for the drunks to seriously injure themselves. “It’s going to be you and me at the end of the day, isn’t it?” He phrased it as a question but he knew it to be a fact. Henry had been there, always. Even thinking back on his childhood before they had met it felt like Henry was there, just at the edge of his vision, waiting to be seen.

“You and I in the Camp of the Dead, Walter. Even if I have to kick in the doors of Methodist heaven to find you.” Henry looked thoughtful. “What is Methodist heaven?”

Walt wasn’t sure. He’d gone to church for the sake of his mother and later Martha but in truth had spent more of his life in sweat lodges with Henry. “Probably a never-ending bake sale.”

Henry frowned, cutting deep creases in his face. “What is Methodist Hell?”

“Probably a never-ending bake sale where the cake is dry and all the cookies have raisins.”

“Either way, I shall spring you.”

“Thanks.” He looked into his coffee. Untasted he still knew it would be exactly how he needed it. Henry had made it. “Are you going to call Mia?”

Henry smiled at him and sipped his own coffee. “No. I do not believe so.”

**Author's Note:**

> “I sometimes forgot about how spiritual Henry was. I had been raised as a Methodist where the highest sacrament was the bake sale.”  
> ― Craig Johnson, The Cold Dish


End file.
